PvP Inside My Head
New and unusual player conflicts are popping up in WoW. I play two paladins. Bela (whom I play with Ry on Proudmoore) is a mellow "Why can't we all just get along?" sort of softie. Ry's forever bitching me out because she buffs the people competing with us for spawns... she pulls hellish aggro by trying to save some poor schmo who's in way over his (and our...) head... etc, etc.
Unfortunately, Bartolomei's personality is a lot more "alive" to me. And so I frequently find myself playing Bela and channeling Bartolomei. Occasionally they agree on quests. Finding the little ghost-girl's doll in the Plaguelands got them both misty eyed, for example. But usually they're on opposite ends of the spectrum.
Bela: Oh no! The poor orcs had their souls torn out and trapped by the demon overlord!
Bart: And I should care... why?
Bela: Aw, this poor tauren's brother was killed by Lakoro'wi. That's so sad."
Bart: <snort> Somebody give that raptor a medal.
Today was a really, really bad day for internal harmony. Ry's home sick, so we were in Fellwood trying to complete a quest. As we approached the dungeon, we saw a tauren druid, Neologism, fighting. Both Bela and Bartolomei were wary, since you never know when the Horde is going to start something and then... (Bela: "And then everything gets really sad and unpleasant." Bartolomei: "And then you have to teach the furball some manners.")
But Neologism seemed peaceful enough. He killed a mob in the front. We stepped past and took the next one. As we finished, he hopped over us. We went like this for some time, happily leap-frogging each other. Digging our way deeper and deeper into what was clearly an enormous dungeon. Bela was happy; Bartolomei kept growling softly, waiting for some ambush or nastiness. Neologism was two levels lower than Bela, however, and four below Ry. So Bartolomei wasn't the least bit worried.
Then, it happened. Neologism accidentally pulled four mobs onto himself and started going down fast. Bartolomei watched, coldly pleased... then screeched in horror as Bela dove into the middle of the mess and AoE'd, drawing most of the aggro onto herself. Ry (a warlock) began raining fire and damnation down on the entire room. And when the smoke cleared, Neologism had about 10 hit points -- but he survived. Many happy /bows, /cheers, and /salutes ensued... as Bartolomei retched quietly in the background.
From there on out, we were a team -- of sorts. We attacked together, smoothly passing off first-aggro so that everybody got a fair share of xp. Trying to communicate purely through standard emotes was a blast... and a challenge. You can't do custom emotes cross-Team (ie., if you type "/em sneezes at the dust", what the Horde player sees isn't "Bela sneezes at the dust" it's "Bela does something incomprehensible.") It was all very touchy-feely and made Bela deliriously happy. However the entire time, I had this voice snarling in the back of my mind: "I can't believe you're helping a stinking tauren!"
Mobs got meaner. Pulls got worse. Finally we found ourselves facing an ugly room with about eleven demons and cultists in it. With careful pulling, we got the eight wanderers out. But there were three mobs, elbow to elbow. Two demons (both Ry's level or better) and a cultist (even con to Ry). Bad, bad, bad... since Neologism and I were lower than Ry.
"Okay, here's what we're going to do," Ry said. "I'm going to banish one demon, have my succubus mez the cultist. Then you jump the other demon. Got it?"
"What order should we..." I never got to finish my sentence, because at that moment, Neologism slid too close to a demon and drew aggro. No problem, I figured. Ry's plan was still good. But as Ry began the banishment spell, disaster struck: our cable modem died.
"Oh no!" I wailed. "I'm link dead! And Neologism's in combat!"
Suddenly there was a flash of merriment in the back of my mind. "Hah!" Bartolomei snickered. "Bet that tauren never knew what hit him!"
To my surprise, Bela spoke up at once (it was a shock, because she's not very "strong" voice). "You are sooo mean," she hissed. And a second later, a full-blown argument took place inside my head.
Bart: "And you, madame, are an insipid cow."
Bela: "Am not. I'm just a nice person."
Bart: <sniffs> "I'm nice too."
Bela: "Are not."
Bart: "Am too. What's not nice about ridding the world of taurens?"
Bela: "Well, I'm generally nice. You're just specifically nice."
Bart: "What's that supposed to mean?"
Bela: "You're only nice to people you like."
Bart: "Whereas you are a Horde-collaborator and traitor to your own kind."
Bela: "Am not. I'm *nice*."
Bart: <sigh> "I guess I shouldn't expect much from someone who plays on a server called 'Proudmoore'."
Eventually we managed to re-start the cable modem and my internal squabbling died down. But sure enough, when we cleared re-pops we found poor Neologism's corpse. Bela /mourned... Bartolomei gloated quietly in the background. I began to fear that the two sides of my brain were never going to speak to each other again.
There was a shimmer, and the tauren's corpse melted away to bones. And who should appear but... Neologism. Able to reincarnate, once we'd cleared the spawn. There was much /dancing, /cheering, and /shivering. Bartolomei was so revolted he actually disappeared from my mind. I think he figured there weren't enough Purify's in the world to save him from sacharine poisoning if he stuck around. And we had a lovely time finishing the dungeon (twice, so that both sides could complete a nice escort quest we discovered down there).